MP Losing Appeal

[RTKBarrett]

They are not as damaging as RTW

.......Orda

Missle troops are quite laughable atm, damage is minimal however crossbows can cause alot of damage if given time. The problem is that in mp time is not given and "rushing" has become extremely common... its come to the point now where its rush vs rush, archers are indeed alot weaker in this game. They either need to increase their potential in either firing rate/damage etc or decrease their cost massively...

[CBR]

Going through the list of units it certainly looks like many missile units do cost a lot. They would have to be quite powerful to justify such costs. Does Palamedes know about this issue?


CBR

[RTKBarrett]

Going through the list of units it certainly looks like many missile units do cost a lot. They would have to be quite powerful to justify such costs. Does Palamedes know about this issue?


CBR

Ive played several games with pala but the main concern in those were to find the causes for lag... Melon probably knows more as he is in the same clan as pala. I believe CA know what the issues are, whether they are going to put the man hours into fixing them is another question.

[pike master]

the reason for my comment was to find out if damage truly is calculated before animations then it should be easier to make larger games run more smoothly. it seems in my rome games on highest settings i can see pike and hoplite spears clear across the battlefield but on mtw2 even on highest settings the pikes will disappear after a certian distance albeit a good distance.

it would seem simple to get the game to play as smoothly as rome on larger games.also the missile system is different than rome in that individual soldiers need to have a line of sight to target to hit accurately. the big problem is that those that dont waste projectiles by shooting them up in the air and running your ammo expenditure down when it shouldnt be.

how possible would it be for them to smooth out large mp games. even dual cores arnt using faster processors if anything they are still slower than single processors right now. and until they start using some of the newer materials their developing cpus are pretty much maxed out.

on single player sure you can max it out all the way but on mp even with the fastest systems you still have to crank it down some. this should not be.

[Vanya]

GAH!

Vanya tossed out the notion of "competitive play" when Olde Shoggy went out of style.

MTW I was still fun to play.

But Vanya rarely played RTW online, and has yet to attempt MTW2 online.

Why?

Simple...

When Vanya goes online, He just wants to play a nice, big game and have fun. But doing that is almost impossible any more. Every game, it seems, is a version mismatch. And if Vanya does find a game to join--or somebody to join His game--they quickly boot ole Vanya 'cause they don't like the stench of His 2-week-old Grapefruit surrogate head, or if they joined Vanya's game, quickly run away claiming they joined the wrong game.

It's no fun if Vanya has to mull around for 2 hours just to get ONE game in.

And if Vanya is lucky enough to actually play a game, it usually ends with some rat bastid escaping the game half way through and ruining it for everybody! Vanya had to wait 2 hours for that?!?

In the Olde Shoggy days, Vanya could sit down and in a 2 hour span, play TEN games!

Balancing issues and all that are secondary to the ability to actually play.

And that is why, in a nutshell, Vanya thinks MP has been in a steep decline for some time now.

GAH!

[Puzz3D]

GAH!And that is why, in a nutshell, Vanya thinks MP has been in a steep decline for some time now.

Samurai Wars is on a steep incline: best engine, best server, best playbalance, largest maps, stable battles, no lag, deep tactics, intuitive gameplay, two or more battles per hour and nobody quits a battle before it's finished.

[ELITEofWARMANGINGERYBREADMEN88]

Samurai Wars is on a steep incline: best engine, best server, best playbalance, largest maps, stable battles, no lag, deep tactics, intuitive gameplay, two or more battles per hour and nobody quits a battle before it's finished.

Hey,

that's why I always try to play Samurai Wars alot during Sundays. on RTW, I used to hate it (still can't get over I was addicted to RTW ) when I sit there for 2 hours, and NO Games. Hontestly, I sit there for 1 1/2 hours-2 hours, and not one Game.


When I used to play VI back in 04, when I first Started. I remember I used to come on every day of the week. or at least 5 days a week. On School Days, I could fit 5 games into a 1 1/2 hour time span. Good games. On Weekends, I would spend 6 hours and we would do Castle games, Steppe Games, etc..., 1v1,2v2,3v3's and 4v4's, all great game and no one ever quit. Hell, I remember Once I played for 6-7 hours straight with only relogging once because I was having so much fun.

[Monarch]

[Marius Dynamite]

The game itself may be contributing to the disconnect. RTW had this same problem in v1.0 and v1.1, but it worked much better after the v1.2 patch. I had no problem staying connected to the MTW/VI lobby and don't even today, but I had terrible problems staying connected to the RTW v1.1 lobby, and they both use GameSpy. Many players, including myself, experienced disconnects in MTW v1.0 until it was patched to v1.1. The disconnect is something CA should definitely look at in the M2TW v1.2 beta and try to improve. CA seems destined to repeat mistakes over and over with every new release which is part of the reason I didn't rush out and buy M2TW.

I never had this problem before the patch. Infact I couldn't even log into multiplayer at first with the patch, but I fixed that after a while, being the clever cookie that I am.

Anyways thats good news that it might just be the patch. I got a 360 and Xbox live over christmas and I just assumed it was that. I mean, undoubtedly the 360 would slow my connection down but I can still play any other game and I can still play lagless M2 with people. It's only Gamespy I have the actual problem with. So it could be the patch thingy :)

[pike master]

according to an email sega sent me about a month ago they have responsibility for connection, server and network code issues. they intend to improve the network code for the software in the next patch. at least thats what they told me.

[Vanya]

GAH!

Vanya wonders what is this thingie called "Samurai Wars"?

GAH!

[Puzz3D]

Vanya wonders what is this thingie called "Samurai Wars"?

It's a throwback to an era when the game was simpler, but ironically the tactical gameplay more complex. samurai warlords forum

[7Bear7Bottom]

Vanya needs a Bear Hug to pop out of third person typing........

[pike master]

does samurai wars have a campaign or is it just for multiplayer and custom battles?

[R'as al Ghul]

It has a campaign. It's a full conversion of MTW to STW, so to say.

Here're some screenshots: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...1&postcount=12

When you click my signature you'll be linked to our subforum. For MP we use the beta_5 version. For SP beta_7 is fine.



R'as

[Gawain of Orkeny]

Damn and here I am fielding predominatly archer armies and winning. I generally use 14 or more. Maybe its themass of fire that works. But as has been said VI is still the best. Also the Lordz are releasing a comercial version of NTW that is centered on micro managing your individual units. I cant wait I do really enjoy MTW2 bugs or no. The biggest drawback is so many games dropping. But after experiencing pre patch MTW1 its nothing.

[Puzz3D]

Damn and here I am fielding predominatly archer armies and winning.

You shouldn't be able to do that. It's represents another playbalance problem.

I cant wait I do really enjoy MTW2 bugs or no. The biggest drawback is so many games dropping. But after experiencing pre patch MTW1 its nothing.

Closing your eyes to the problems is a way to enjoy it. I'm not going to do that. They either improve the game up to the previous level or you won't see my clan playing it.

[t1master]

at what point will your clan decide it's not worth playing and posting about?

[econ21]

Damn and here I am fielding predominatly archer armies and winning. I generally use 14 or more. Maybe its the mass of fire that works.

You shouldn't be able to do that. It's represents another playbalance problem.

That's interesting, Gawain. I was surprised when looking into the ratio of archers in historical medieval English armies and 14/20 would not be unreasonable for the iconic Hundred Years War encounters. I could not imagine such an army working in SP, let alone MP. I would have thought you need more of a meatshield - even enemy infantry is upon you after a couple of volleys in M2TW. However, given what you say, I may try to play my English SP campaign with more historical proportions of archers.

But, Puzz3D, I'm not sure why you shouldn't be able to win with an archer heavy force? Isn't that historically what the English (and, if we consider mounted archers, Mongols) did? I would have thought the ideal would be to allow a variety of army styles to be competitive, not set up the RPS so that only a balanced force should be able to win.

[Puzz3D]

But, Puzz3D, I'm not sure why you shouldn't be able to win with an archer heavy force? Isn't that historically what the English (and, if we consider mounted archers, Mongols) did? I would have thought the ideal would be to allow a variety of army styles to be competitive, not set up the RPS so that only a balanced force should be able to win.

I didn't say a balanced army should be able to beat that, but there should exist a counter army that beats it. Only when counter armies exist do you get a variety of army styles used. Players should be able to take any army they want with no tax penalty. The fact that CA has put a tax on more than X of the same unit type is an admission that the units aren't balanced.

Balanced armies shouldn't be able to beat all other army types. Unfortunately, we can't demonstrate that in Samurai Wars because of that confounded tax on more than 4 of one unit type.

[Puzz3D]

at what point will your clan decide it's not worth playing and posting about?

I'm never going to drop the issue as long as people keep claiming something is better when it isn't. M2TW has better graphics, and that's the only thing that's better in MP. You know as well as I do the large number of excellent players that have left Total War MP. They wouldn't have left if the newer Total War games were really better than the original game. Online participation in STW was still increasing a year after release up until the horribly balanced MI add-on was released.

[TosaInu]

I'm not sure why you shouldn't be able to win with an archer heavy force? Isn't that historically what the English (and, if we consider mounted archers, Mongols) did? I would have thought the ideal would be to allow a variety of army styles to be competitive, not set up the RPS so that only a balanced force should be able to win.

There's winning and a simple walkover. A unit that results in a (say) 9 out of 10 victory without requiring much input from the player is probably too strong. STW WE 1.0 had the Nag Cav, MHC and MLC, MTW had the lancers in high era (in combination with swipebug and bfu). Of course a archer heavy army should have a chance to win.

I'm not sure the English won because of the bow. Sure, it was more than just a fine weapon and those guys knew how to use it. The battle at Agincourt for example was not just decided by raining 100,000 arrows upon French knights though. There's even research that the bodkin largely failed there, because of the class armour used by the French. The archers did kill a lot sucked into mud knights by stabbing into their visor with small knives. At any rate, terrain, weather, pride and human behaviour influenced the battle a lot.

My personal view is that the English did not win the conflict but the French lost it.

The mongols are yet another story. Their strength was being mounted and an array of unusual tactics.


A balanced army is nice as you almost always have a best unit to counter, it also has a drawback because may find yourself short of just that extra archer, or just that extra knight to combat the other.

It's not a problem when a player likes to wage his chances with a archer heavy army and get good results with it, it does become a problem when that/those units start to dominate every battle because no other army manages to beat them (regularly).

I am fielding predominatly archer armies and winning. I generally use 14 or more. Maybe its the mass of fire that works.

I recall hearing other signals about archers. So, seems Gawain of Orkney just knows how to use them properly?

[t1master]

i agree yuuki, that the old community and game are pretty much gone for good. i just don't see the point in restating what has been. the new community, many of whom never played shogun or mtw, do not care about the game play issues that the rtw and m2 brought. at what point does it stop becoming worth the time and effort to point out over and over again how things were better?

[TosaInu]

not care about the game play issues that the rtw and m2 brought.

This is an interesting point. There are several interesting points actually.

The conflict between old and new is not good.

Old can not tell new to stop enjoying the game if they do. But new can't simply tell old to shut up either. The previous titles had their flaws too and old, some of them are playing TW since 2000, had their hopes for improvements with patches or future titles.

And of course, if new likes the game, by all means enjoy it. However, the old is not just a senile pissing in your tea. It took me at least two years to understand all the flaws in STW, though I enjoyed the game. How much better could STW have been if an older one pointed at the flaws right away so they could be ironed out? Of course you need CA for many things if something needs to be patched. But right now, nothing can change or improve. Not because there is no agreement, but because of lack of discussion. That discussion doesn't have to result in a big compromise where everyone is a bit happy and a bit sad, heaven forbid. Modern software is flexible enough to give everyone the best.

Perhaps the knives should be put away when talking with each other? Talking with each other instead of yelling at each other? Also keep in mind that humans have to make it for us. Perhaps it will turn out beneficial for everyone?

[guyfawkes5]

Tosa is right, expecially given that I was probably one of the ones shouting and losing sight of the bigger picture. A plan of action is needed to at least attempt to improve the situation; and I believe that if anyone disagrees with my previous statement then they shouldn't participate.

So far in my experience every thread that has attempted to improve multiplayer and relations with CA with a sound and workable plan has been crashed by posters advising that CA 'will never listen'. It's just my conclusion that you should devise new plans or at least keep trying; because if you're not participating constructively then why are you here?*

*By the way that was not a knock at older players or a threat to anyone etc etc... just advice that working to improve the situation is the only option we have really.

[econ21]

I didn't say a balanced army should be able to beat that, but there should exist a counter army that beats it.

Gawain said he was winning with archer heavy armies, but that does not imply there is no counter army. Another player said M2TW missiles are "laughable", so the jury's out.

In SP, archers seem nicely balanced. Nearly everyone must have played the Agincourt M2TW demo and got a taste of what massed longbows can, and can't, do. They remind me a little of MTW arbalests - slow firing, but lethal when they hit. But they are not as overpowering vs the AI as arbalests were. In effectiveness, they remind me more of STW archers - nice to have, but not the only trick you'd want up your sleeve. I'd want to hear more MPers report similar experiences to Gawain before I drew any conclusions about them being too strong. Right now, I think missiles are one of the things M2TW got right.

I recall hearing other signals about archers. So, seems Gawain of Orkney just knows how to use them properly?

Indeed. Or his opponents don't know how to counter them properly. I suspect it's a rare army type that most players are not very experienced in countering.

Or maybe Gawain is just a good player.

I'm not sure the English won because of the bow.

Me neither - my point was merely that, from a realism point of view, missile heavy should be a viable army style. Having 60% of their troops armed with bows certainly did not stop the English winning some of the key battles of the HYW.

[pike master]

the best thing we can hope for is that another developer comes along with a better game engine and balance. to me there seems to be a rift forming between people who want a historically unit balanced game and a small minority elite who could soon as less care what the game purchaser thinks.
and as has been stated before most of CAs developers only play it in single player if they play the game at all.

[t1master]

the old vs new community strife will not necessarily hurt the community discussion overall it does happen elsewhere, it will simply hurt it here.

it's good to have many viewpoints as to what is good in a game and what is balanced, but what we have at the org seems to be the same 14000 posts from the old crowd, who stopped playing rome during the first months telling the new community, who has grown up on rome and now moves into m2 that the game is not worth the time. why even bother to post then? if you have no intention to play the game; accept that you have moved on(or you have moved or been shoved by ca aside, develop a gamestat for m2 that will have the appeal of the old community, or sit in the shadows and have a pint.



you can counter the arrow army with a strong rush. gawain is good at getting his army out of the way, all whilst shooting at you.

[Stoicblitzer]

All i can add myself, is that the focus should be on all players, not just clanbods. So many times i have entered the forum to see 6 clan only games with passwords, but none for others. if you want more players then you have to be open to new players.
I am used to it as ive been playing for a while, but i can see it as being offputting for those new to the game.

we make clan games because randoms normally crash games. they do not understand that GS SUCKS and that if they have a router they need to forward ports. seldomly do randoms display skill or respect (CTRL+A and left-clicking the enemy general displays neither). these things ruin games that take ages to get hosted and are a miracle if they make it to the 'start deployment' button.

lack of respect b/t clans is also off-putting. WIN WIN WIN at all costs! 8 max cav? ok ill go 12 upgraded pikes 8 upgraded cav! imo, playing like this displays no honor and winning is hollow. this is almost entirely CA's fault for making such an unbalanced BETA. moreover, screenshooting every single win to be used later is disgusting. it's utterly hopeless.

the main reason i still play mtw2 mp is because RTK retains their membership in a silly tournament. foolishly, i volunteered to captain the team. i am beginning to regret this decision.

i'd rather find something else to do sometimes...*frustrated*

[|Heerbann|_Di3Hard]

the old vs new community strife will not necessarily hurt the community discussion overall it does happen elsewhere, it will simply hurt it here.

it's good to have many viewpoints as to what is good in a game and what is balanced, but what we have at the org seems to be the same 14000 posts from the old crowd, who stopped playing rome during the first months telling the new community, who has grown up on rome and now moves into m2 that the game is not worth the time. why even bother to post then? if you have no intention to play the game;

Easy answer. I have bought the game, because the demo was too poor to test it right. After the disappointment of the full version I have sold my mtw2 and told the community my opinion about the game. CA should also know, that not all are happy with their game. The bugs in mtw2 are many in number and heavy in impact. A forum is a location for discussion. And a discussion consists of different opinions.